


Abandoned

by Vuetyris



Series: Operative Warren [3]
Category: Warframe
Genre: Abandonment, Child Neglect, Gen, Pre-Canon, Somatic Link - Freeform, Somatic disconnection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-09
Updated: 2017-08-09
Packaged: 2019-09-14 04:27:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16906101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vuetyris/pseuds/Vuetyris
Summary: Mal didn’t think this would be his last mission





	Abandoned

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr; moving to Ao3 for storyline reasons.
> 
> Mal, before the collapse, far before Warren found him.
> 
> -+- Kudos, comments and sharing are encouraged! -+-

“They’re faulty.”

It was the last words he heard before the somatic link was altered, and rings through their somatic link as the evergreen warframe wanders through the desolate ship. His operator is stuck in a conversation he’s not privy to, only able to feel her vitals through the sympathetic link. Looking for something among the abandoned refuse, he doesn’t know what – his operator does. There’s a tightness that flows through their transference; balling up and sitting low in his chest. But she’s not in troubled, not worried about her own safety but… for his?

He doesn’t linger in the confusion, the excalibur prime surveying the stale quietness of the empty halls as he proceeds. Around him is only silence, only able to hear near muted footsteps and an ambient hum from internal processes – tapped out of his small operator’s auditory senses. An attempt to re-synchronize their link is outright denied. His operator shakes her head.

He’s not allowed; she’s not in charge.

The prime can feel his young operator’s frustration, marked by a hammering in her chest and biting lips that carries through their link. Still in conversation; not conversation, it’s not calm. There’s a soreness that ignites in his unused throat, a biting that makes him pause and hold over his gilded plated throat. It’s nothing new, he figures, continuing through the abandoned halls – and midstep he feels a harsh slap.

The sympathetic transference overrides the alteration, and he can hear what she can. “You are going to unlink from that dysfunction immediately, or face the consequences, demon! A faulty model like that has no place in the war efforts.” An older voice, one he’s heard at least a dozen times during his short series of operations. He can’t understand – dysfunction?

“I won’t! He’s my friend – I can’t just,” his operator, body shaking in effort to suppress the retaliated rage. There’s pain across their cheeks, a forming bruise on her he can only faintly feel. She was struck, and a growl rumbles through his systems. “I won’t leave him there. It’s not right,” the coil within his chest stirs, crawling up into his throat and squeezing tight. Hands land on her shoulder, and he stands still – fangs bare to nothing.

“Listen, Natia. I know you mean well,” the older voice starts, traced with a sweetness that made his operator’s stomach knot. “But, face it, it’s doing nothing to fight the sentients. You know it yourself; he can’t handle combat and that’s what warframes are only good for. They’re not people, they’re puppets.”

His operator is silent, fluid dripping at first down her stricken cheek. The tightness persists, coiling and undulating in a tide as the operator lingers in thought. He can do nothing, but wait. In the back of his thoughts lies a single word.

‘Don’t.’

“Natia,” the older voice starts again. “They won’t suffer, I promise you that. When the connection is severed they’ll be out like a light. No pain. They won’t feel a thing unlike now.” Natia’s heart surges, a choked swallow. “Right now, they can feel what you’re feeling. You don’t want him to be hurt, don’t you? It’d be better this way.” A hand strokes away rolling tears. “Don’t you remember that he feels whatever you do?”

“Y-yes,” barely creaks out of Natia, a transferred emotional twist when she realizes the excalibur is tapped into their conversation. “Can’t he be left anywhere but there, there has to still be some-”

“No,” is said strict, biting into their somatic link.

Silence.

“There’s not enough room to leave it for later. You either disconnect voluntarily, or be manually removed from them.” The voice states flat, the grip on shoulders pressing hard. “What will the choice be, Natia?” It’s said bitter and harsh, stabbing their shared tightness deeper through their link. By now the excalibur prime sat himself within the immense room he found himself in, staring at the near still waters of the abandoned Orokin ship. He sat flat against a wall, somewhere his operator guides him.

“I’m sorry, Mal,” Natia bites back, a pressure pushing at their face. “Goodbye.”

There’s a quiet snap as their link breaks, static tearing through his end of the abandoned link. It blossoms through biological circuits, pressing back against the wall his operator sat him against as unrelenting shock tears through his systems. Then it’s… gone, leaving him empty inside. There’s nothing to feel, and his body goes lax. Quiet, powerless; not dead, and aware.


End file.
